WhatsApp Business automation: Streamline communication for better efficiency

The Kaleyra team looks at how enterprises can use WhatsApp Business automation to communicate more efficiently and more effectively.

WhatsApp is one of the most used instant messaging platforms globally, boasting over 2.24bn active users per month. While WhatsApp Business is excellent for customer communication, managing huge volumes of messages can be quite a mammoth task for most businesses. Thanks to powerful WhatsApp automation features, you can streamline your communication process, save time, and improve overall efficiency.

Automation has become an indispensable tool for businesses in today’s fast-paced world. With WhatsApp Business, you can automate customer communication, ensuring timely and accurate responses. In this post, we discuss the benefits of WhatsApp Business automation and explore ways to implement automation across several business departments for maximum productivity.

WhatsApp Business Automation Benefits
There are several use cases for WhatsApp automation. Let’s look at the top benefits of WhatsApp’s Automation features:

Better customer service
According to Gartner, when issue resolutions involve high effort, customers are 96 per cent more likely to be disloyal to brands and 81 per cent more likely to share negative word-of-mouth. However, many growing businesses struggle to keep up with high volumes of customer queries. Automating WhatsApp responses helps deliver prompt customer service beyond business hours.

WhatsApp chatbots help automate FAQ responses so that your customers get timely and accurate replies. Moreover, automation ensures round-the-clock availability, resulting in customer satisfaction.

Less response time
90 per cent of customers say an immediate response is essential, and 60 per cent of customers consider “immediate” to be 10 minutes or less, according to HubSpot Research. WhatsApp’s automation features help speed up your response time, leading to quick issue resolution.

Unlike manual typing, automated messages provide instant replies to customer queries, which may take longer. For example, if a customer wants to know the insurance plans suitable for their income range, WhatsApp messages can be pre-configured to immediately provide a list of plans. On the other hand, it can take more time for an agent to type the list or copy and paste a relevant reply.

WhatsApp is a popular channel, where customers are more likely to be available to continue a conversation. In addition, unlike email conversations that may span days, WhatsApp allows quick two-way communication, considerably reducing response time.

Wider reach
WhatsApp hit the milestone of 100bn messages daily in 2021. The massive popularity of the messaging platform makes it an effective channel for reaching diverse sets of audiences. Moreover, according to a study, WhatsApp users respond in less than a minute. Hence, with automation, you can target a broader audience in less time and encourage dialog for maximum engagement.

Reduces operational cost
Integrating WhatsApp with other business systems, such as CRM, can improve efficiency and save costs. For example, you can automate the creation of support tickets and sending reminders by setting up triggers in CRM workflows. Chatbots Magazine says businesses spend around $1.3 trillion on customer service, and chatbots can help save up to 30 per cent of the cost.

Enhanced customer experience
With automation, personalization is easier because you can set up WhatsApp messages to include customers’ names or reference recent purchases. For example, if your customer has added a Christmas sweater to their cart, you can send a personalized message offering a discount for them to complete the purchase. Sending custom messages helps provide an outstanding customer experience and may result in repeat purchases. Moreover, WhatsApp business automation ensures customers don’t have to repeat themselves, making the customer experience seamless.

Improved conversion rate
WhatsApp trumps other channels, such as email and phone calls, with a whopping conversion rate of 45-60 per cent. In addition, you can use automated messages to help users check out and share payment options, speeding up your sales process.

You can shorten the sales cycle by sending automated messages across the customer journey. Sending personalized discounts, payment reminders, and sale alerts helps improve the conversion rate. 

WhatsApp Business Automation Across Departments
Let’s see how WhatsApp automation can benefit different business departments.

Marketing
Marketing automation is an ever-evolving business domain. Businesses must be agile to stay on top of current trends, strategies, and innovative tools to reach the right audience. For example, WhatsApp automation is emerging as a sought-after tactic to attract audiences, and engage and nurture leads, setting up the stage for easy conversions.

With WhatsApp API for Business, you can get key messaging insights, such as the number of messages delivered and read. As a result, you can define a messaging strategy best suited to your business and automate campaigns for maximum benefits.

Since WhatsApp supports sharing product catalogs, images, and videos of your products in action, audio files, and PDFs, you can easily share manuals, eligibility criteria, How-to guides, comparison charts, pricing plans, and troubleshooting information. Moreover, you can personalize the offers by automating promotional messages, increasing the likelihood of sales. In addition, WhatsApp automation can also help in retargeting customers based on their browsing patterns.

Sales
Engaging customers with timely WhatsApp messages helps foster positive customer relationships. With WhatsApp chatbots, you can provide proactive and contextual customer communication. The resultant meaningful engagement builds trust, leading to more sales.

WhatsApp chatbots allow you to automate interactions with potential customers, pre-qualify leads, and schedule appointments, saving time and improving efficiency. Moreover, chatbots can also help collect customer information and provide personalized product or service recommendations. With CRM integrations, leads can be routed to the right salespersons who can go on to close the sales.

Customer Support
69 per cent of customers first try issue resolution on their own, but less than one-third of companies provide self-service options such as FAQs or knowledge bases, according to Zendesk. With WhatsApp Business API, businesses can offer a self-service channel through pre-defined responses to common queries.

Automation helps businesses eliminate long queues and delayed responses. Instead, you can provide quick and efficient support through the messaging platform. For example, with WhatsApp, you can implement chatbots to address frequently asked questions, and route complex queries to support agents when needed.

Recruitment
Messaging apps are becoming a preferred channel for candidates to reach brands regarding queries on jobs. The widely used platform enables you to reach many candidates, speeding up recruitment. Furthermore, with automated responses, you can engage multiple candidates and answer common questions about the status of applications, perks, work culture, office locations, and work policies.

Internal Communication
WhatsApp is well-known as a powerful tool for customer communication. However, it is also an efficient tool for managing employee communications and streamlining internal processes.

By automating internal communication, you can ensure that all departments are in sync and can access updated information. For example, you can onboard new employees with template welcome messaging with information kits pointing to valuable resources. Similarly, you can collect feedback regularly through WhatsApp messages and share company updates. Moreover, simplified communication with WhatsApp improves collaboration, thus increasing productivity.

WhatsApp Automation for Enterprise Businesses
In conclusion, WhatsApp business automation can be a powerful tool for enterprise businesses to streamline their communication, increase efficiency, and deliver outstanding customer experiences. To discover more about how organizations can utilize WhatsApp Business messaging, contact us today.